Vendor Spotlight: Stampendous Glitter

Some of my first, and favorite crafting memories, involve glitter and glue. It’s rare to find something so basic, so easy to use, that can add so much to a project, not to mention good for all ages.

While the act of glittering hasn’t changed much since my childhood, the glitter sure has. Stampendous recently sent me a box of their glitter goodies. The variety in textures, colors, and sizes are simply amazing!

They have just about every type of glitter you could possibly want. Do you want a bright, shiny, jewel color? They’ve got you covered. Or maybe some shimmering crystal is more your style? They’ve got it, in three different grain sizes: ultra-fine, fine and medium.

Here’s a rundown of the five types of glitter I tried. I’ll also show you later the difference in three sizes.

First up is the Crystal glitter, available in ultra-fine, fine and medium grain. This glitter is translucent, so the underlying color shows through. I like to mix the different sizes to make snow, but more on that later. It has a great sparkly shine.

The Pastel glitter also is translucent, and adds a hint of its own color. It’s available in five colors, all ultra-fine. Stampendous says it’s best used over similarly colored surfaces.

If you’re looking to add lots of color to your project, the Jewel glitter is perfect for you. It has a great sparkle, and deep, rich colors that in general will cover up the underlying color of your project. It’s available in 24 colors in the ultra-fine grain size. As Stampendous explains on its web site, this opaque glitter will add a metallic shine to projects.

Now for those of you want the super shiny, bling-bling, the Halo glitter variety is for you. It’s available in gold and silver in ultra-fine, fine, and medium grain sizes. This glitter is holographic, so it picks up a rainbow of colors. Stampendous says it can be mixed with embossing powders. I give that a try later on in the article, so stick with me.

The Pearl glitter is another opaque variety, available in 13 colors and the ultra fine size. It’s a polyester glitter, and I found that while it has a shine, it has more of what I would call a matte finish. It’s best in thin layers, over similarly colored surfaces.

Phew, now after that glitter primer, I bet you all want to know how to use it.

First up, I tried out this lovely Jumbo Pine Drift tree stamp and stamping block that Stampendous sent me with the glitter.

Check out the size of this stamp; it’s perfect for a card or even a scrapbook page.

I wasn’t sure if I would like the Jumbo Perfectly Clear Handle. I was worried it was too thin, and would get all inky. You can see the thickness here; it kind of reminds of a cutting plate for a die cut machine.

Oh, how wrong I was. The size and thickness of the handle made it so easy to get a nice clean image of the jumbo stamp. I don’t know if it would have worked as well with a traditional stamp block.

To bling out my tree in some yummy glitter, I used an EKSuccess 2-Way Glue Pen, also sent by Stampendous. I highlighted certain areas of the tree’s needles, and dumped on Jewel moss green glitter first.

Then I added more glue in different areas and dumped on Jewel sea green glitter. I love that the Jewel glitter has different shades of the same color, so you can add a little more interest, shading, or highlighting to your projects.

I also used some Pearl glitter in cherry on the ornaments. Here’s my finished tree.

But then I decided I wanted my tree to look like it was out in a snow storm. For this, I mixed Crystal fine and medium, and dumped it over strategically placed globs of Scotch Scrapbookers Glue with 2-Way Applicator. I wanted the glue to stay dimensional.

My tree needed a home, and clearly, it needed to be just as sparkly. I decided to mix Halo Gold in medium with Halo Silver in fine with some Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel (UTEE). Here’s my special little mix.

I stamped the swirl stamp from the Stampendous set with embossing ink, dumped on the mix and heated it up. I was concerned that it wouldn’t work, especially with the larger crystals of UTEE, but it looks great. I like the slight shimmer the Halo glitter gives to the embossed image.

And here is my finished card:

Next up, I put together a gingerbread garland for my kitchen this Christmas. I started with a chipboard gingerman mini book from Michaels. I covered four pieces with patterned paper, then outlined each with my Scotch glue before adding ultra-fine Crystal glitter. I wanted it to look like icing.

I added some brads for eyes, and used my Scotch glue and Pearl glitter for the smiley mouth.

For his jaunty holly, I used my Vagabond to die cut the leaves, ran them through my Xyron Create-A-Sticker 150 for overall adhesive coverage and added moss green Jewel glitter to one and sea green Jewel glitter to the other.

Check out the great, sparkly coverage.

Here’s my girl gingerbread woman. Her buttons are in moss green, and she got Pastel pink glitter cheeks, courtesy of some Glue Dots.

I needed some accent pieces for my garland. I took some plain wooden spools from the craft store and wrapped them with Scor-Tape.

I removed the paper liner, and spread on some moss green Jewel glitter. Love this! I know I’ll be doing this again. By the way, after all the use of the moss green glitter, I still have 3/4 of a tube left. A little truly goes a long way.

Look at those towers of glittery goodness.

But I didn’t stop there. Gingebread men/women are cookies, right? So naturally, I needed to add some cookie cutters. I didn’t want them to be jealous, so of course they got glittered too.

For this job, I decided to use Glossy Accents. I used Halo Gold and a mix of ultra fine and medium Crystal. Here’s the Cyrstal mix.

And here’s the Halo. I think I like this one better.

Here are some glamour shots of the finished banner. Phew, that took a while.

By the end of my crafting sessions, I was covered in glitter and so was my craft area. But it was so worth it. I loved all the variety of the Stampendous glitter, and then it could be used on so many different surfaces. It also worked well with different adhesive, whether it was liquid, tape or glue dot.

Stampendous glitter is available individually in small jars (4.5 grams) and large jars (15 grams) as well as glitter kits.

Pros:

Lots of variety in color, type and size of glitter, whether you want opaque coverage or something more subtle.

Can be used on multiple surfaces and with multiple types of adhesives.

Adds a great sparkle to all projects.

A little goes a long way, so even with the smaller jars, it will last you awhile.

Cons:

Like all great crafts, it can get a little messy.

You’ll want to glitter anything that sits still long enough.

Have you tried Stampendous glitter? What’s your favorite type? What do you like to glitter?

Great review and awesome ideas! Love the gingerbread banner! I have a little tip for cleaning up glitter… Martha sells a Glitter Cloth, (aka Tack Cloth, when used by painters and woodworkers), to remove dust before applying a finish. You can get Tack cloths in the painting department of many hardware stores. The cloth has a tacky substance soaked into it (soft wax maybe), so when you wipe it across a surface, it easily picks up any glitter particles.